king and his knights are coming," they cried. "Come
let us see them as they pass by."

"Who will take care of the sheep?" asked Jean, but nobody answered, so
he too left his dinner and ran with the rest, away from the pastures
and up the hillside path that led to the highway.

"How pleased my mother will be when I tell her that I have seen the
king," he said to himself, and he was hurrying over the hill top when
all at once he remembered the forest, and the wolf, and his
grandfather's words.

"Come on," called the others.

"I must stay with the sheep," answered he; and he turned and went
back, though the pipes and the drums all seemed to say, "Come this
way, come this way." He could scarcely keep from crying as he
listened.

There was nothing in sight to harm the sheep, and the pasture lands
were quiet and peaceful, but into the forest that very day a hungry
gray wolf had come. His eyes were bright and his ears were sharp and
his four feet were as soft as velvet, as he came creeping, creeping,
creeping under the houses and through the tanglewood. He put his nose
out and sniffed the air, and he put his head out and spied the sheep
left alone in the meadows. "Now's my chance," he said, and out he
sprang just as little Jean down the hill.

"Wolf, wolf, wolf!" shouted Jean. "Wolf, wolf, wolf!" He was only a
little boy, but he was brave and his voice rang clear as a bugle call
over the valley, and over the hill, "Wolf, wolf, wolf!"

The shepherds and knights and the king himself came running and riding
to answer his cry, and as for the gray wolf, he did not even stop to
look behind him as he sped away to the forest shades. He ran so fast
and he ran so far that he was never seen in the king's country again,
though the shepherds in the pastures watched for him day after day.

Jean led his flock home at eventide, white sheep and black sheep and
frolicsome lambs, not one was missing.

"Was the day long?" asked his mother, who was watching in the doorway
for him.

"Are the sheep all in?" called the sick father.

"Did the wolf come?" said the old grandfather; but there is no need
for me to tell you what _Jean_ said. You can imagine that for
yourself.

[*] From "More Mother Stories," by Maud Lindsay. Used by permission of
the author and the publishers--the Milton Bradley Company.

BABOUSCKA[*]

Russian Legend

It was the night the dear Christ Child came to Bethlehem. In a country
far away from Him, an o